


Cypress

by coalitiongirl



Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Hunger Games Setting, F/F, Swan-Mills Family
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-01-22
Updated: 2014-01-22
Packaged: 2018-01-09 16:35:36
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 14,413
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1148249
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/coalitiongirl/pseuds/coalitiongirl
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>[Swan Mills family Hunger Games AU] Emma and Henry are forced to return to the Hunger Games for a second time- where friends are foes, the world around them is trying to kill them, and Regina Mills may be their undoing or their salvation.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Cypress

**Author's Note:**

> This should be easy enough to understand with a basic understanding of the plot of The Hunger Games/Catching Fire. People forced to kill people for a bloodthirsty audience, you know the drill~
> 
> Oh, and forget about all the rebellion details because I tend to overthink these things and had to dismiss that aspect because this would be double the length with that arc included, lol.

No one had asked many questions when Emma had won. She’d been seventeen, in decent shape from years fending for herself on the streets of District Nine, and had had enough skill with a knife that she’d been one of the favorites to win even though the Capitol had lacked certain vital information about her. If she’d seemed luckier than her peers, well, that must have been simple good planning on her part, and her audience had been glad to root for her.

 

But Henry had been twelve. Twelve, inexperienced, stumbling his way through the Games, and no one had had much faith in him at all. His luck was suspicious, his quiet victory without doing anything more than hiding for a week unexpected, and Emma can hear the murmuring even within her own district at his victory. _Sheer dumb luck_ , she’d assured friends, and they’d nodded with disbelief in their eyes.

 

Henry had been _alive_ , her son back in her arms when she’d thought him gone forever, and she doesn’t give a damn that the whispers grow louder and the sidelong glances bolder. They’re done with the Hunger Games, have more than earned their due as a family, and they’re going to be happy now. Safe. Free.

 

The Quarter Quell is announced days after Henry’s victory tour, and she curls up beside him in his bed and weeps for hours.

 

* * *

 

There are no other living tributes to select from District Nine, and she can see their designated escort’s eyes virtually light up when he reads their names off the paper. “Mother and son!” he says, delighted. “A human interest story, to be sure! The audience will love you.”

 

Henry squeezes her hand and she squeezes back, eyes blank as they run over the silent crowd.

 

* * *

 

Henry is still woefully unskilled, a child clinging to her in the Training Center, and she sees contempt, curiosity, and sympathy ranging across the faces of the other former victors. She knows most of them from previous years- had been friendly with them, even, before they’d all been named enemies this year, and she can see blame on several faces when they stare at Henry.

 

They’re here because the Capitol wants to see more of this impossible victor, and there are some who won’t forget it, come Game day.

 

Emma glares at the resentful ones, dares them to say anything to Henry that she doesn’t like, and perhaps it’s because she’s holding a spear cocked and ready in her hand that no one approaches. She scans the crowd of tributes, making her intentions clear, and her eyes halt on an unfamiliar face.

 

The woman watching them is a Career, her clothing matching the other District Two tribute, and Emma has never seen her before. She’s slightly older than Emma and Two has no shortage of willing mentors to train their tributes, so it isn’t impossible that they’d have a volunteer Emma has never met. Still, though, there’s something about the way that she watches Henry, emotionless and intent, that sets Emma on edge.

 

She sidles over to one of the few tributes she trusts- more than the others, anyway- her eyes still fixed on the Career. “Ruby. Who is that?”

 

Ruby follows her gaze, her eyes rounding when she catches sight of the Career. “Oh, no, Emma, don’t start up anything with her. That’s _Regina Mills_. And I heard she volunteered to get back in the arena.”

 

_Regina Mills._ She knows the name, remembers the Games two decades ago when the woman had been fifteen and Emma had been only nine and far enough from the Games to still be fascinated by them. Regina had been beautiful, soft-eyed, a darling of the Capitol from the start. Emma hadn’t understood why she’d volunteered in the first place, since she hadn’t looked like a killer at all.

 

She’d teamed with other Careers immediately after the bloodbath at the start of the Games. She’d worked with them for one day, hanging back rather than taking the lead. And when they’d slept at night, she’d stabbed all five of her allies to their deaths, leaped onto the back of a vicious horse-like muttation, and rode wildly through the fields of the arena, killing everyone in her path. She’d had the single highest kill count in the history of the Games and had inspired hesitation from the audience instead of enthusiasm, her unrelenting bloodlust beyond even that which the Capitol embraced.

 

She hasn’t been back to the Capitol for Games since, ostensibly rejected even by her peers for her poor sportsmanship and deemed an unfit mentor, and Emma feels her skin crawl as she traces those still-beautiful features, the face carved from stone that’s fixed on Emma’s son. She stiffens under her gaze, glares at her with extra ferocity as Regina observes them in silence. “I’m gonna kill her,” she mutters, and she knows she might have to mean that very soon.

 

* * *

 

She doesn’t want to leave Henry alone but he drops her hand and bounds off to inspect the slingshots before she can argue with him. “I’m going to look even weaker if I can’t let go of my mom,” he’d told her almost reproachfully, and she tightens her empty hand into a fist, dragging her feet as she makes her way over to the sword station.

 

Mulan is predictably already in place there, inspecting the proffered weapons, and she spares only a nod for Emma before she selects a short sword. _How quickly we’ve become enemies_ , Emma thinks, and pulls a crescent sword out to practice, daring a glance at her son. He’s already moved on to the archery station, cocking his bow at holographic targets with unsteady hands, and she swallows.

 

He needs to be stronger, more precise, more assertive, because these combatants are the best of the best at surviving and they’re going to have to be a team to stay alive. She can’t ask Ruby or Graham or any of the others to ally with her, not when her sole goal in this Game is to carry Henry through; and she can’t count on anyone else to be a friend when they’re all looking at her one ally as though he’s fresh meat, smirking every time his hand falls and he struggles with the bow.

 

Henry’s going to be on his own after these Games, she knows, because she will readily die so he can be victor, and she needs him to be stronger than he’s ever been before. He draws the string of the bow back and squints at the arrow’s direction, aiming for the target and missing wildly, and Emma bites her lip with frustration.

 

A hand lands on her shoulder. “Let him be,” Mulan murmurs. “He will find his place.”

 

“We don’t have _time_ for him to find his place,” Emma bites out, but Mulan is finally looking at her and there’s sympathy in her eyes, and they may yet not be enemies after all.

 

“He is a child,” she allows. “They learn quickly.”

 

Henry’s brow is furrowed with stubborn determination and he refuses to look her way, producing another arrow and aiming for the target again. His shot goes even wider this time, shooting upward and dipping toward the Careers practicing with throwing axes.

 

Emma curses, but then a dark-haired woman shifts, her hand blurring with speed as she snatches the arrow out of the air and turns to regard him again. Regina raises an eyebrow, something almost touching on amusement in her eyes, and before Emma can move, she’s striding toward Henry, arrow in hand.

 

Emma is rigid with wariness, her fist clenched around the sword she’d been practicing with, and Mulan’s grip tightens on her shoulder warningly. “Fighting is forbidden in the training room,” she reminds her, but Emma wrenches away from Mulan, her sword clenched in her hand as she strides across the room, pausing a few feet away from her son and the deadly killer beside him.

 

There’s no malice on Regina’s face, and Emma doesn’t relax but she doesn’t move either, not until the other woman is bending down beside Henry, graceful fingers closing over his hands. “You’re gripping too tightly,” she cautions him, tugging at his fisted hands. “That’s why your aim is off whenever you loosen the bow. It’s not the enemy, it’s a tool. It’s working for you.”

 

A flash of revulsion washes over her. “Get the hell away from him.” And now Emma’s gripping the other woman’s arm tighter than Henry holds his bow, yanking Regina away from her son.

 

Regina rolls her eyes, unimpressed as she wrenches her arm away. “There’s no need to fight. I have no interest in you.”

 

“You don’t go near him!” Emma snaps, fear and defiance catching in her throat. “You don’t talkto him, you don’t look at him; and if you ever touch him again, I don’t give a damn about the _rules_ because I will-“

 

The next arrow flies from Henry’s bow and impales itself on the target. It’s far from the center, but it’s closer than it’s ever been, and Henry nearly yelps with excitement. “Did you see that? Did you see what I did?” he demands, and he seizes Regina’s hand, pulling her back to him.

 

Regina smiles. It looks alien on her face, false and uncertain, and Emma’s eyes narrow as it blooms. “Well done, Henry. Let’s see if you can replicate that.”

 

This is wrong. This is _terrifying_ , because Regina Mills always has an agenda and Henry can’t be on it, not when they’re just days away from the Game. “Henry-“

 

But her son is shaking his head, his eyes pleading with her as he still clutches onto the other woman. “Mom, _please_. I need to be better for you. We’re going to die if I’m not.”

 

_She’s going to kill you if you do_ , Emma thinks, but Regina has already ignored her, her attention on Henry, and Emma is left standing behind them, sword in hand, fuming and sulking and completely, utterly petrified.

 

* * *

 

She stands over them when Henry charges for Regina the next day, when the other tribute begins training him again and pays little heed to his wary mother. She’s out of practice, probably, in desperate need of some training of her own, but she can’t leave Henry alone with that woman; not when Regina still watches him so keenly when they’re not together and not when Henry is less and less cautious around her with each passing hour.

 

She’s warned him of what Regina is capable of the night before, had sat with him in their apartments and told him all she’d remembered of Regina’s Games and the monster no one had suspected was hidden within.

 

He’d looked doubtful. “Everyone’s done horrible things to win the Games, though, right? Even you had to kill a few of the other tributes. And Regina’s nice to me. She even-“ He’d stopped, frowning, and says no more on Regina, shrugging off his mother’s panicky warnings.

 

Regina _is_ nice to him, and that terrifies Emma even more than open hostility would. She stands with him and his bow for hours in the morning, her lips curling into a smile every time Henry hits his target, and whispers encouragement in his ears that even Emma’s too far away to hear. She looks at him like she’d looked at her interviewer at her last Hunger Games, with gentle eyes and soft features, and Emma’s heart clenches whenever she touches Henry.

 

And Henry looks to her for guidance with everything he does. He’s rejected Emma’s aid but he willingly follows Regina from station to station, listening to her advice with an attentive face he hasn’t turned toward Emma in years. Which…yeah, the kid loves her and looks up to her, but Regina has been elevated to hero stature in his fickle eyes in just a day, and she might be a _tiny_ bit jealous. Mostly concerned, though. Very, very concerned.

 

Regina smiles easily with Henry, the guarded coolness that envelops her around the other victors absent when Henry addresses her, and Emma watches her supposed thawing with misgiving. Regina can flip a switch and transform from friend to killer in an instant, Emma knows, even if Henry dismisses her warnings with teenaged frustration.

 

_Couldn’t he have bonded with Graham instead? Or Mulan?_ There are people in the training center she’d still classify as honorable, whom she might have trusted with Henry, but instead it’s the inscrutable Career that Henry has chosen- and who has, ostensibly, chosen Henry as well.

 

The only blessing that comes from Regina’s interest is that the other tributes give Henry an even wider berth now, look to him with vague respect and less suspicion. Maybe they see him as fodder for the deadliest tribute now. Maybe they’re under the flawed impression that he’s now under her protection. Either way, Emma breathes more easily (and less so, whenever she sees the woman who’s standing beside her son) in the room.

 

She sits beside Ruby at lunch, listening halfheartedly to Killian Jones across the table telling a story that’s really not for Henry’s ears, waving his single hand to illustrate the lewdest details. He’d lost the other hand in an ill-fated battle during his Games, years before Emma had been born. “Watch the kid,” his companion murmurs, running her fingers through greying hair as she glances at Henry. Milah, an often mentor for District Four tributes.

 

“If he’s old enough to fight in the Games twice, he’s old enough to hear a damn joke,” the blond victor from Three snaps, chewing on his bread with crankiness-induced force.

 

Henry scowls at his plate, and a smooth voice inserts, “I think you can control yourself for the moment, hm, Mr. Jones?” Regina glides into the seat beside Henry, an eyebrow arched with challenge, and suddenly the air is tense around them, the other victors stiff and mistrustful.

 

There’s a snort from where Tink and her counterpart from Twelve are sitting. “Killian Jones controlling himself. That would be a sight,” Tink sasses, smirking.

 

Killian smirks right back, the tension dissipating. “Well, we’re all going to die in a few days. Might as well enjoy it while it lasts.”

 

Regina watches them all, her lips twitching as though she’s unsure whether she should be smiling or frowning, and Emma watches Regina until the other woman turns to her, looking annoyed. “Problem, Miss Swan?”

 

“I think you know my problem,” Emma says, her jaw clenched. Ruby nudges her, but she ignores the admonition.

 

“Mom, _please_ ,” Henry mumbles as the other tributes lean in with interest for a confrontation, and Emma’s eyes narrow at Regina. For her part, the Career turns back to her food without another word.

 

“What are you going to do for the Gamemakers?” Henry asks her, changing the subject without a glance at his mother or the other tributes.

 

Regina’s face lightens. “I think I’ll just scowl at them until they cry. Like so.” She screws up her eyes at Henry in what Emma is positive is a mockery of her own glare, and Henry snickers.

 

Regina grins back at him, and Emma is torn between wariness and frustration and quiet relief, because Henry hasn’t laughed once since the Quarter Quell was announced. She settles for a milder glower at the other woman.

 

Regina turns a skeptical smirk on her in return, curving lovely features into something nearly playful, and Emma flushes and looks away.

 

* * *

 

Henry earns a score of six with his limited bow skills, three points higher than he had the year before, and Emma manages a respectable nine. Regina scores a ten, and Emma swallows, steeling herself for a battle she isn’t certain she can win.

 

She _has_ to, for Henry. That’s what she has over Regina. A reason to fight.

 

And another thing, but it’s no guarantee against these opponents.

 

She sings Henry to sleep that night, wrapping the thirteen-year-old boy in her embrace, and cries silently into his hair.

 

* * *

 

She doesn’t dare swim for the Cornucopia bearing all the weapons they can use, not when Henry is treading water a few feet away and Killian is spearing tributes like fish. Instead she gasps for breath and struggles toward her son, cursing her district for its lack of water and herself for her lack of swimming aptitude.

 

Something shoves hard against her and she’s blindsided, falling beneath the surface just as a spear nearly impales her, and suddenly there are small hands guiding her back up, pulling her out of the water as she chokes for breath. “Henry!”

 

“No time, Mom.” They’re nearly on dry land, and they dash through the underbrush as one, Emma spitting out saltwater with each step forward. She makes it to a grassy clearing before she can’t stand anymore, too much water in her stomach, and she falls to the ground and gags out what feels like gallons of water while Henry vigorously slaps her back.

 

She’s barely finished when there’s a suspicious rustle in the woods to their left, and she freezes, pressing a finger to Henry’s mouth. He nods shakily, rising to his feet again, and there’s very suddenly a bow in his hand and a knife pressed into hers.

 

She throws it out of pure instinct, impaling the culprit before he moves again, and she remains in a crouch, waiting for further movement.

 

Instead, a cannon goes off and a body drops in the bushes in front of them, the knife still sticking out of the boy as his eyes stare sightlessly at the sky. She doesn’t know him well, and _that’s_ a quiet relief. He’s a Career tribute, one who’d won his Games without much fanfare a few years before. Peter something.

 

He’d been armed with a sword, and they’d have been an easy target if not for the weapons Henry had somehow procured. “Henry. You didn’t make it to the Cornucopia.” She’d given him strict orders to stay away during the bloodbath.

 

“I found them in the water.” He shrugs, refusing to meet her eyes. It’s the same face he’d made when she’d tried to talk about Regina to him, and her brow furrows with suspicion.

 

“Henry, we don’t have any friends out here. Not anymore.”

 

He shrugs again, testing his bow, and she rolls her eyes upward in frustration and stalks deeper into the woods.

 

* * *

 

They find a small outcropping of rock near the edge of the arena and settle down beneath there for the evening, Emma standing over Henry as he lights a fire, acutely aware of the audience watching them. “Be _careful_ ,” she warns him in a whisper, and he only nods.

 

The faces of the fallen appear in the sky just after the sun sets, and Emma counts them silently, her voice catching in her throat as they pass. Peter, of course. Tamara from District Three. Nearly all of Districts Five and Six. August from District Seven, who’d been an arrogant ass most of the time but still a friend. Aurora, one of the youngest and most unexpectedly vicious in the Games this time. A woman she hadn’t known well from Eleven. Tink’s grouchy older friend from Twelve.

 

And she’s already fallen into the mindset of the Games, because she’s tallying the losses even as she grieves and counting the ones who are left and still threats. _Jefferson, Mulan, Ruby, Graham, Killian, Milah, Tink._

_Regina._

Henry echoes the name on her mind, and she glances at him, startled. He smiles. “Regina’s okay,” he says simply, and she wants to remind him that there can be only one survivor in the Games, only one victor, but then she thinks of the fact that they’re both competitors in this battle, too, and decides not to bring it up. She shivers, squeezing his hand in hers.

 

Then she shivers again, and it’s not about the dead tributes or the Hunger Games, but a sudden chill in the air. A chill that’s only getting worse as they sit around their fire. “Henry?” she says, watching as a puff of air escapes her mouth. “I think we’re going to need to-“

 

An enormous hailstone hits the side of their shelter and cracks, sending splinters of ice everywhere. Emma feels the shards crash against her cheeks, drawing blood even as the temperature grows colder and colder. Henry looks up at her, a hand pressed to his own face to stop the blood.

 

A second hailstone hits, then another, and suddenly they’re caught in the middle of a storm of lethal shards of ice, staggering through the cold toward the east. “Be careful!” Emma spares again for Henry, shouting through the roar of the ice and wind, and they both run forward, the ice shards bouncing off of them as they do, leaving them unscathed.

 

They run and they run and they run until, abruptly, there are no storms at all, no chill in the air, only a billowing cloud of ice that stops at a barrier they’ve just crossed. “A force field?” Henry guesses as Emma inspects him, running fingers over the bloody mess the ice had left on his face.

 

“Must be.” She nods, saying loudly for the cameras’ benefit, “The cuts are barely superficial. Just a lot of blood.” She spits onto a leaf, wiping away the blood as Henry makes a face. When she’s done, there are only faint scratches where the ice shards had hit him.

 

She does the same to her own face, forcing a smile for Henry. “So I guess we’ll need a new place for the night.”

 

Henry brightens. “Wait.” And suddenly he’s running back toward the ice, his hands outstretched as he reaches into the barrier, and she shouts his name, panic overwhelming her, before he emerges again, a hailstone in newly scraped up hands.

 

“What the hell are you doing?” she demands, yanking him toward her.

 

He beams up at her, a bluish light emanating from his hands. “Water, Mom!”

 

* * *

 

They melt the hailstone into a crude pitcher she manages to carve out of some bark and share it, gulping at the cold water greedily. The storm is still howling nearby for what must have been nearly an hour, but it never comes any closer, never crosses that invisible barrier a hundred feet away from them, and Emma begins to relax as the storm dies down.

 

No one else could have crossed that hailstorm and no one would be foolish enough to approach it, so they’re safe from the other tributes for the time being. They’re ensconced in a thick circle of bushes right now, too exposed for a fire but safe if they remain in place, and they can stay here for the night and wait for any edible animals to approach. She tousles Henry’s hair as he leans against her, allowing herself a small smile. “Looks like we’re here for the night, kid. I’ll take the first watch.”

 

“Okay.” He curls up against her, his eyes fluttering shut almost immediately, and she leans back against a tree trunk, surveying the land around them.

 

The arena is small, much smaller than it had been for Emma’s own Games or Henry’s the year before. She can see water glittering in the distance- or no, those are fireflies, sparking blue and green just beyond the trees to their right. The weather here is damp and warm, and she wipes moisture from her forehead, watching the fireflies’ approach as she does.

 

There are some buzzing through the bushes now, lights gleaming brighter and brighter, and she closes her eyes, her head aching at the sudden burst of illumination. Still, though, the buzzing is getting louder, the fireflies converging on their position, and she nudges Henry carefully, caution winning out over exhaustion.

 

He jerks awake, his eyes flying open, and the fireflies react to his sudden movement as one, buzzing angrily as they congregate over him, their lights strong enough to blind both Emma and Henry as Henry shouts. “Mom! _Mom!”_

 

“Close your eyes!” she orders, sliding forward to try and block him from them, but now they’re countering her movements, focusing on her as their target. “Henry, I need you to run!”

 

“No!” He’s waving their pitcher wildly, trying to push the fireflies away, and they buzz even more and attack his arm, leaving little red burns along his wrists where the skin is exposed. “I have to help-“

 

And she lies, because they can’t outrun these fireflies that are already attached to them, not when they’re so attracted to their every shift in position. “We need to split up to draw them apart!” she snaps. “Back to where the hailstorm was. I’ll meet you there!” The hail, at least, is manageable with their unique set of abilities. She doesn’t think she can muster up the focus to distract these fireflies and remain unobtrusive.

 

Henry takes off, running back where they’d come from, and Emma jogs in the opposite direction, keeping her pace slower than his, swinging her arms from side to side and bobbing her head in time to her feet. Her movements are more erratic, wilder, and the fireflies stay glued to her even as others detach from Henry to attack her.

 

She runs and runs until she passes through what must be another barrier, forcibly detaching angry fireflies from her skin as she collapses a few feet from them, covered in stinging burns and the blue and green lights still dancing frenetically in her eyes. She struggles to draw on her emotions, to imagine the pain receding, but her head is growing heavier and she closes her eyes instead, exposed and immobile and in danger she’s too drained to contemplate.

 

* * *

 

She wakes up underwater, caught in a rush of water so fast that she barely has time to awaken before it’s sweeping her away with sheer force, slamming her down through the trees into the water. She chokes and lays herself limp, letting the water pull her along, pressing her arms to her side so they aren’t ripped off by the force of the wave.

 

She lands in the water near the Cornucopia, her skin red and peeling and stinging from the saltwater, and doggie paddles through the water toward the island at the center–

 

–Just as an axe whirs past her ear and she ducks back into the water as Tink pops her head out of the Cornucopia, readying a second throwing axe. She closes her eyes, willing herself not to breathe, and pops out of the water and hurls her knife at Tink with halfhearted precision.

 

It hits its target but only barely, embedding itself in Tink’s thigh as she shouts out, “Swan!” and topples forward, out of the Cornucopia and into the water one spoke over from Emma.

 

“I’m…” Emma starts, and it’s an automatic apology, empty and useless, that she swallows as the other woman sinks, her eyes wide and dulling already. _Only Henry can live_ , she thinks- she’s thought a dozen times- but it doesn’t make it any easier to watch Tink fall into the water, the cannon booming in eulogy and her heart aching as painfully as her body.

 

She doesn’t want to kill anyone, doesn’t want to do anything these Games but hide with Henry and avoid the enemies whom she knows so well. She doesn’t want to see a twenty-something boy or Tink dead at her hand, and she doesn’t want to feel the intense relief that comes with knowing that one more enemy is down for the count.

 

She paddles toward the Cornucopia, digging her way inside, and finds another knife before she curls up inside and surrenders to exhaustion once more.

 

* * *

 

She wakes up several hours later for long enough to hear Killian and Milah nearby, speaking in low tones about a poisonous fog they’ve managed to escape, and waits tensely for them to discover Tink’s death. There’s a howl of agonized fury from Killian when he spots the body lifted from the water, the knife still within it. “Swan’s handiwork,” he mutters, and Emma tightens her grip on her new knife, tense and ready for their attack.

 

Milah exhales. “Mothers will do anything for their sons,” she says, not without heaviness in her voice, and Emma would have wondered about it if she weren’t too busy focusing on healing her wounds and escaping notice. “We’d better get back to the tree. We’re too exposed here.”

 

Their voices fade away in time, and Emma pulls herself out of the Cornucopia, inspecting her injuries. They’re lightening against her skin, the pain nearly all gone, and she doesn’t have the energy to worry about how that’ll look to the Capitol. Let them derive their own conclusions, reasonable, rational ones. She needs to find Henry.

 

She steps gingerly along the spokes that lead back to dry land, soaking wet and exhausted and sore, and struggles to remember where she’d come from. _Right…there._ And if each spoke marks another barrier, then Henry should be somewhere within the wedge of land two spokes to her right.

 

She creeps along through the forest, tracing their steps to the outcropping where they’d lit their first fire, and she’s just past where she’d killed Peter when she hears low voices.

 

“Just stab the brat.” Whale, the sour-faced genius from District Three. “She can’t get us both before that.”

 

She hears Jefferson’s sneer as her blood runs cold, knowing exactly who they’re targeting. “Yes, and which one of us do you think she’s going to kill then?”

 

A third voice, low and dangerous and female, and it leaves her tense and maybe just a tiny bit reassured. Henry’s optimism is catching, it seems, even when it’s based on fallacies and faith. “The moment either one of you moves, you will both be dead,” Regina says silkily, and Emma creeps forward, parting the trees to peer out at the three of them.

 

Henry stands between Jefferson and Whale, his bow cocked at Whale as Jefferson hovers behind him, a trident in hand. He’s glaring at both of them, but his hands bely his fear, shaking uncontrollably as he struggles to keep his shot. Regina stands just behind him, a throwing knife in hand, her eyes flashing as she stares down Jefferson. None of them see Emma as she slips closer to the man threatening her son, her heart pounding so loudly she’s surprised no one notices.

 

“Okay. How about we all back down?” Jefferson suggests, breathing heavily through his nose. “Victor and I will move on, and no one dies here.”

 

Emma steps on a branch and it cracks loudly.

 

Jefferson spins around and Regina’s knife hits its target with deadly accuracy, slicing into his throat so quickly that he’s dropping to the ground before Emma can dodge. She jumps back, raising her knife in warning as she sizes up the other woman’s distance from her, and Regina has another throwing knife in her hand in an instant, raising it threateningly at Emma.

 

There’s a muffled groan to their right and both women jerk, twisting to face Henry as he lets out another cry. Whale is holding him against him, one arm wrapped around Henry’s throat and a hand pressed against his mouth as Henry kicks wildly, struggling to be let free.

 

Emma stills, her hand tight on her knife. “Don’t move,” she snaps to the other woman as Whale’s eyes gleam with triumph.

 

“I’m aware, Miss Swan,” Regina says snippily. “What now, Whale?”

 

“I am going to go toward the water,” the man announces. “Don’t follow me and I’ll let the brat go back to you.”

 

“No deal,” Emma retorts. “I wouldn’t trust you as far as I can throw this knife.”

 

“How about another deal?” Regina says sweetly. “You let Henry go, and I make your death a quick one.” Her lips curve into a smile that doesn’t reach her eyes, and Emma licks her lips nervously.

 

“You trust _her_?” Whale sneers, shaking his head at Emma. “Listen, if you want your son-“

 

She sees the moment Henry stops caring about their secret in the way his eyes shift as he focuses within himself, his eyes clouding over for an instant before Whale is forcibly thrown from him, smashing into a tree as an impossible wind seizes him and hurls him away, leaving Henry on his knees in front of them with no sign of what he’d done beyond a faint gold mist.

 

Regina throws her knife before Whale can get back up, impaling him in the chest, and her eyes flicker toward Henry, expressionless. “That was quite a kick,” she tells him, but Emma can see the hints of recognition in her eyes, the doom that awaits them both now that Regina’s put the pieces of the puzzle together and discovered what they’ve been hiding for the past year.

 

She’s moving before Regina finishes her sentence, throwing her against the closest tree and raising her knife to the other woman’s throat.

 

* * *

 

_Magic_. Scholars scoff at the idea of its existence, and it’s been reduced to no more than an old myth, an impossibility in the face of cold, hard science. But Emma knows better, has heard about it from legends and a boy she’d once known, has seen it in herself and in her son.

 

She knows what the Capitol does to those it perceives as a threat and knows that any magical ability would be seen as such, and she’s trained Henry to hide it deep within him even in dire circumstances. _Be careful, be careful, be careful_. Magic is how he’d survived last year, but Regina Mills is the last person she’d trust with that knowledge, and it’s her desperation to keep her son safe that drives her to push the blade deeper, drawing a trickle of blood from the Career’s neck.

 

“Miss Swan,” Regina murmurs warningly, but she only pushes harder in response, willing herself to kill the woman who’d just saved her son’s life.

 

“Mom!” But even Henry’s pleading isn’t enough. He’s young and innocent and he wants to believe the best in people, even when his life is on the line, and she can’t afford idealism right now.

 

Regina sighs, sounding more irritated than terrified. “Really, this is enough, dear,” she says, and something changes in her eyes, something dark and predatory set free, and Emma is thrown backward without a single movement from Regina, hurled into the outcropping behind them by a maelstrom of wind and power that can only mean one thing and one thing only.

 

_More magic._

 

Regina follows a moment later, pressing Emma against the rocks behind her, her hand pressed against Emma’s right wrist. “Y-You!” Emma manages to hiss, still stunned by the magic and the realization. “You have-“

 

“Yes, me,” Regina murmurs against her ear, and they’re so close that Emma can feel her chest heaving against her, her breath warm against her cheek. Too close for any cameras to pick up. “I had ulterior motives in volunteering for these Games.”

 

“Henry,” Emma breathes, her eyes darting to where her son is still in a crouch on the ground, watching them both with concern.

 

“Henry,” Regina confirms, and her hand slides up along Emma’s arm to her shoulder, still gripping her tightly in a faux-lover’s embrace. “I had to know if he was truly what he seemed to be last year.”

 

“ _Who_ ,” Emma corrects her, her hackles still raised. “He’s a _person_.”

 

“He is,” Regina agrees, and there might be affection shining in her eyes as she tilts her head back to regard Emma fully. “And a valuable one, too. He’s only a child.”

 

They’re still so close, millimeters away from each other, Regina’s body pressed to hers, and Emma struggles to focus. To remember the enemy. “Yeah?” she mutters. “How many children did you massacre when you were fifteen?”

 

Regina’s eyes shutter closed, the affection gone and replaced by steel. “I’ll take the first watch,” she says, turning away to address Henry as though they’ve come to some agreement with their argument.

 

Which they haven’t. Emma folds her arms. “Do you seriously think I’m going to go to sleep while you stab us in our sleep?” she says, disbelieving.

 

Regina’s lip curls. “Feel free to keep an eye on me. You already know enough to destroy me, as well,” she reminds Emma.

 

“Lucky for you, only one person is making it out of here alive,” Emma says grimly, turning very deliberately to Henry.

 

She gets only a grunt in response from Regina, and unsure if it’s acquiescence or derision, she settles for a scowl in the other woman’s direction as she slides down against the outcropping, preparing for hours watching their unreliable ally.

 

* * *

 

There’s an electric storm in the distance, lightning hitting a tall tree and sparking new fires that rise up and die down every few moments. It’s contained to a wedge of land far from them, and Emma closes her eyes for a moment, the light still flashing behind her eyelids. “I’m serious,” she says, keeping her voice low so Henry’s sleep won’t be disturbed. He’s stretched out between them, his face turned toward Emma with a peace she doesn’t share. “Any alliance I make in these Games is about keeping Henry alive. And if you’re not willing to die for him…”

 

Regina is contemplating Henry, her eyes hooded and her fingers twisting around each other. “I’m aware of that.”

 

“So you’d die for him,” Emma persists, disbelieving. “You’d give up your life for a kid you barely know.” She wants a guarantee, a promise from a woman renowned for breaking promises, and she knows it’s a moot point but she doesn’t care.

 

Regina looks up in response, and her features have more written across them than Emma’s ever seen before. It makes her gasp, reeling backward for a moment, stunned to silence by the intensity swimming in those eyes. “Is there a better reason to die than that?”

 

She catches her breath, still unsure if she can- _how_ she can- trust Regina, but unable to look away from that gaze or doubt it. “No,” she agrees.

 

The other woman catches her chin for a moment in a steady grasp, her thumb tracing circles against her cheek, and Emma can feel heat rising in her face again. “Then we’re allies,” she says, and there’s almost a smile ghosting across her face at the acknowledgement.

 

Emma doesn’t move away, feeling as though it might mean surrender at a game she isn’t sure they’re playing. “Allies like the other Careers were in your last Games?” she demands, her fingers sliding across her side to feel for the reassuring metal of her knife.

 

She thinks Regina might attack her, might darken again or snap out a warning, but instead the other woman laughs softly, dropping Emma’s chin and wrapping her fingers around one of her own raised knees. “You’re like a dog with a bone,” she says, almost to herself. “Horribly irritating. I like you.”

 

Emma scowls, displeased at the mockery. “You gonna kill us?”

 

Regina shakes her head, but it’s impossible to tell if it’s a negative or just frustration with Emma. Emma slouches against the tree, dissatisfied and annoyed.

 

* * *

 

She must have drifted off eventually, exhaustion winning out over caution, and she awakens to Regina, eyes wide with panic, shaking both Henry and her awake as another hailstorm begins.

 

“We need to run where it’s most concentrated!” Emma shouts, remembering the fireflies to their right.

 

Regina follows without argument, Henry at her heels, and they’re nearly out when Emma remembers that they’ll need more water today. “You go ahead! I’ll be right there,” she orders, reaching out to catch a huge hailstone.

 

She forgets the magic Henry had used the night before to cushion the blow and the rocky ice slams into her grasp before she can pull her hands away, her wrists suddenly crying out with agony. She ignores the pain to throw a hand to her eyes as the hailstone shatters in her hands and the ice is flying toward her, sharp shards attacking her like a thousand tiny knives. It’s shredding her face, a thousand times worse than the fireflies, and she’s screaming, helpless to run to safety or move at all, and she thinks she can hear Henry in the distance calling _save her, save my mom!_ but it’s all fuzzy, and her ears are hurting too, and she’s falling, falling…

 

Strong arms catch her, dark eyes gleaming in the white hail flying around them, and Emma shuts her eyes as the world turns warm again and a cold hand is pressed to her cheek.

 

* * *

 

She exists in delirium for a long time. There are moments when she can’t feel her face, when she’s certain it’s been grated to pieces and she’s long dead. There are moments when the bites on her arm feel even more acutely inflamed than her face and everything is agony, even while she can feel healing magic pouring into her. She hears Henry’s voice all the time, and sometimes she hears Tink, too, speaking in harsh tones, and Milah talking about mothers and their sons. And there’s another voice, one within which she finds new fear and solace, and she moves useless limbs closer to it, sensing somehow that it is her salvation.

 

She opens her eyes and Henry is smiling down at her, his eyes bright with tears. “Mom,” he says, touching her shoulder. “You’re awake.”

 

She blinks. “How long was I out?”

 

“Over a day. This is the second afternoon.” He holds their pitcher out to her, and she dribbles water into her mouth, pulling herself up to slump against the rocks. “The hailstorm comes only once every twelve hours, so we’ve been moving you back and forth between this barrier and the one before it. There are a bunch of earthquakes for the hour before the hailstorm, but they stop right before the ice storm so we just cross over quickly.” He digs into his bag, producing some tree nuts and offering them to Emma. “Food?”

 

She eats them gratefully and swallows, frowning. “We?” It can’t be…

 

“Me and Regina,” Henry says, wrinkling his brow. “You do remember that Regina’s here, right? She helped-“ He stops, mouthing out the words _heal you_. “She went down to the beach to see if she could find some more shellfish.”

 

“Regina is…still here,” Emma echoes, feeling that wild panic surge within her again. “She hasn’t tried to hurt you? Or me?”

 

“ _Mom_.” It’s said with all the frustration of youth, coupled with an eyeroll of teenaged proportions. “Regina’s on our side. She fought off one of the tributes from Eleven to keep us safe, and she’s been making sure that you’re okay and getting better.”

 

Emma seizes on that rather than mulling over the confusion that Regina Mills brings. “Who else…who’s still around?”

 

Henry lifts up eight fingers, ticking off the names. “As far as we know, just Killian, Milah, Mulan, Jack, Graham, you, me, and Regina.”

 

“Ruby?”

 

He shakes his head. “There are wild monkey mutts across the water. Regina saw her get…” He swallows. “I’m sorry, Mom.”

 

She sags, pushing back the intrusive _at least you didn’t have to kill her_ and focusing instead on the woman approaching them with a net full of fish. “Regina,” she mumbles, still wary.

 

Regina inclines her head. “Miss Swan. How are you feeling?”

 

“Confused,” she says honestly. “But thanks for… for taking care of Henry. And me.”

 

Regina smiles, tight-lipped and uncomfortable. “You know my reasons.”

 

“Still,” Emma persists, not knowing why she’s pushing. There’s a secret part of her that likes Regina’s discomfort at her gratitude, that wants to see that smile spread across Regina’s face and soften the cool expression she has now. “You’re the only reason either of us is still alive.”

 

And there’s a sobering thought that stiffens them both, because there can only be one survivor in this game, and they both know that this is only drawing out their ends.

 

* * *

 

She still doesn’t quite believe that Regina’s not going to kill them in their sleep, but she doesn’t think that’d be a well-received reason for staying up that night. “I think I’ve slept enough,” she offers, and Regina only nods in acquiescence.

 

She stares up at Ruby’s face as it flashes across the sky and sags when she sees Jack’s, too. _Seven_.

 

Henry is asleep between them as soon as the hailstorm is over and they’re settled in for the night, and Emma buries her fingers in his hair, finding comfort in his nearness. Regina watches her, silent, and when she speaks it’s with measured tones. “Does he…will he have anyone to look after him?”

 

It’s something she’s worried about since the moment the Quell was announced. “I have some friends in my district who’ve agreed to keep an eye out for him. I’m hoping some will move to the Victor’s Village, but people aren’t as excited about that as they are in some districts.”

 

“No?”

 

She sighs. “It’s harder when it’s just the two of us, you know? I’m sure District Two has dozens of kids who grow up in the Victor’s Village. But Henry’s been pretty isolated. The other kids resent him for it, and I don’t think there are many people who’d invite that resentment onto their families.”

 

Regina nods, and Emma continues, emboldened by the understanding in her eyes. “I thought about moving out, even. Going to live with everyone else and try to get by without all the luxury of the Capitol. But…” She stares at the ground. “I grew up a street rat, all alone and dependent on the kindness of strangers to survive. I wanted Henry to have everything I didn’t.”

 

“Of course. We all want better for our children.” Regina laughs without amusement. “Better to wish comfort on your child because you lacked it than wishing the Hunger Games on her.”

 

Emma’s eyebrows shoot up. “Your mom?”

 

Regina leans back. “It’s a _gift_ in District Two. A point of pride and glory. I never wanted it. But Mother thought it best that I compete.”

 

She remembers seeing Regina on her screen, the seemingly gentle girl who’d seemed woefully unequipped to kill. “You managed nicely in the end, though.”

 

Regina laughs again. It’s cold and harsh. “I suppose so. I was an outcast when I returned home. Mother was mortified.”

 

“And how were you?” The question escapes before she can think it through, pure curiosity instead of judgment, and Emma waits for a reply for so long that she opens her mouth to retract it when Regina finally speaks.

 

“Different.” Her eyes gleam, reflecting the artificial moon above them, and she says no more for the remainder of the night.

 

* * *

 

They all climb down to the beach together the next morning, all too aware that if they’re not in the thick of the action, the Gamemakers will force them into it. “Mulan must be in rare form,” Emma muses, squinting in the glare of the sun toward the golden horn of the Cornucopia. “Graham isn’t the type to grandstand, so it’ll be Killian and Mulan who’ve been stealing the show.”

 

“You mean you don’t think the Capitol has been focusing on your unconscious face for the past two days?” Regina says with mock surprise. “What a terrible loss.”

 

Emma turns to stare at her, not quite sure if the Career is being acerbic or playful. “I have a pretty nice face!” she objects, and maybe she’s a _little_ offended. “Henry, don’t I have a nice face?”

 

Henry rolls his eyes. “You’re not horribly pockmarked, I guess. And those scars are going down already.”

 

Well, that’s reassuring. _Not_. And especially not when Regina is laughing at them both, her eyes alight with mirth that brightens her whole damned flaw-free face into something even more stunning than before. “Well, you have my nose and mouth,” she sniffs, stalking closer to the water with Regina’s net. “You’re welcome.”

 

Regina catches her wrist before she can keep walking, and she turned, miffed and a bit puzzled at the other woman’s warm gaze. “You do have a rather striking face,” Regina allows, and said striking face is suddenly hot with a flush that spreads down along her neck and shoulders.

 

Regina follows the blush down to Emma’s chest with her eyes, and Emma squirms, suddenly in a hurry to get back to the water. “I’d better-“

 

When she returns, Henry is restringing his bow and Regina is murmuring something in his ear, quiet enough that the cameras won’t pick it up. Emma squeezes in beside her. “The idea is to hone skills you already have through focus,” Regina mutters. “You know how to harness your abilities, just use them to enhance your aim and speed.”

 

Emma bends forward, wisps of Regina’s hair escaping her still-perfect coif to tickle Emma’s lips as she speaks. “Who taught you about…?” She doesn’t dare say _magic_ , not even in an undertone.

 

“There was a highly placed Capitol official who…borrowed me,” Regina breathes, glancing toward Henry’s curious face.

 

Emma swallows. There’s no need for him to find that out yet. Or ever, if she had any say in the matter. She’d been fortunate to be spared any of that level of servitude out of what she suspects is pure snobbery from the Capitol- she is, after all, from a less notable district, free of the connection to the Capitol that so many Careers share. And she can hope the same for Henry after this. He’s a cute kid, but nowhere near the attractiveness level of Regina or that Peter Career or Milah, back in her prime, and she’s never been so grateful for that as when he’d come home a victor in the Games.

 

Regina shakes her head, her lips soft against the shell of Emma’s ear, and Emma shivers. “It could have been worse. I wasn’t very popular.” She remembers, thoughtful. “He had a powerful friend who looked at me and knew what I was capable of and gave me some proper training while I was there. Focus, elemental skills, teleportation and transmutation, healing... He was dreadful, but I learned everything I know from him.”

 

“Huh.” Emma frowns, wondering if there could be more than one highly placed Capitol official who dabbles in magic. The coincidence would be a bit much, that Neal’s father was... “I was never given any official training. I just kind of…picked up on whatever I could to survive.”

 

Regina raises her chin haughtily. “Yes, I can quite tell, Miss Swan.” But there’s no malice in it, and Emma thinks she’s finally figured out that that _look_ in Regina’s eyes is indeed playful.

 

She grins in response, tipping her face back to catch the sun’s rays, and for a moment, she can close her eyes and imagine that they’re not in the arena, awaiting certain death for the most part. They’re out on a beach somewhere, she and Henry and this somehow tolerable woman who’d once been a killer and now is…an ally? A _friend_? And they’re safe and warm and happy, the yoke of the Capitol gone at last.

 

And it’s then that Graham stumbles out of the brush behind them, an axe in hand, and the peace is shattered once more.

 

* * *

 

He stares at them for a moment, eyes wide like a deer in the headlights of a car, and Emma takes the opportunity to snatch her knife from its resting place and raise it warningly. “Hey, Graham.”

 

He nods curtly. “Emma. Henry.”

 

There shouldn’t be anything to say, not when they’re some of the last remaining tributes in the arena, but Emma’s stomach clenches at the thought of killing another friend. They’d been close, and not just out of mutual respect but genuine friendship. He’d won the Games two years before she had and he’d been with her since she’d returned to the Capitol nearly every year, guiding her through her mentorships and making her _laugh_. They’d even had a brief dalliance one year during the Games, and though they’d never followed up on it, she can’t help but search for the way his face softens when he regards her even now. “I’m sorry about Ruby,” she murmurs, and he breathes heavily.

 

“So am I.”

 

Regina is tense beside her, a throwing knife suspended between two of her fingers, and Emma places a calming hand on her thigh. “How do you want to do this?” she asks Graham.

 

His head drops. “I’m not going to kill the boy, Emma,” he says helplessly. “I don’t think I could hurt you, either.”

 

“Yeah.” She thinks she could, if Henry is in danger, but she doesn’t say so.

 

He smiles under his scruffy beard, his eyes warm. “I can make this victory easier for you, though,” he says, and before she can move, he’s running toward Regina, his axe knocking aside her first knife and catching the second head-on as she leaps to her feet, her face dark with ready murder.

 

The panic that washes over Emma is, Emma realizes suddenly, not just for Graham but for Regina as well, fear at seeing her die. _She saved my life. We have an alliance. She smiles like_ \- “Wait!” she shouts as Henry shrinks back, holding his bow up but staring from Graham to Regina, unsure of which to target. “Graham, _wait_!”

 

But he doesn’t hear her, too focused on his enemy, and Regina is throwing knife after knife, catching them as Graham sends them flying back to her and hurling them right back at him. He’s nearly in front of her, his axe swinging toward her head, and Emma sees something unexpected in Regina’s eyes.

 

_Fear._

 

Regina hasn’t fought anyone in close combat since the Games had begun, and she hadn’t engaged in it in her own Games, either, Emma thinks. She’s all about precision and sheer talent, not the brute force that an axe will demand from its foe, and only magic- magic she can’t afford to use- would give her an edge against Graham.

 

She doesn’t realize she’s moving until she’s wrapped around Graham, her arms tight around his upper arms, holding him in place with her knife at his neck. “You can’t,” she says, raising her chin above his shoulder to meet Regina’s frightened gaze. “Graham, she’s helping us. She’s the only reason Henry and I are still alive.”

 

His muscles are still taut, prepared for a battle. “She won’t be helping you forever. Only one person comes out of the Hunger Games alive, Emma, or have you forgotten?” He sags against her. “Ruby and I would have helped you, you know. If you’d only asked. We don’t…I don’t think any of us would have wanted to survive the Games this time knowing that Henry didn’t because of us.”

 

Regina is rigid opposite them, her eyes scanning their faces and her knife still ready to be thrown. Emma shakes her head. “I don’t know what I’m supposed to do here anymore. But I can’t let you hurt Regina.”

 

And now there’s something bordering on disbelief in Regina’s expression, tinged with a hint of wonder, and Emma looks away, embarrassed, her knife unsteady at Graham’s throat. He reaches up to gently disentangle her from around his neck, brushing a kiss to her cheek as he murmurs, “Don’t forget what she’s capable of.”

 

He takes off for the woods again and Regina glowers and flings one knife after him, impaling it on a tree right beside him. She’d have thought it a near miss if she hadn’t seen exactly how polished Regina’s technique is, but Graham clearly does, because before Emma can sigh with relief he’s hurling a throwing axe directly at Regina, so quick that she can’t stumble away in time, the axe too close to dodge.

 

And abruptly, something blue shimmers in the air and a shield pops up out of nowhere, deflecting the axe, Henry’s fingers spread out as he focuses on keeping it intact. “Henry, no!” Regina snaps, but the axe is twisting in midair, too quick to avoid as it spins toward Emma, and then it’s Regina’s turn to throw up a hand and cast out an unmistakable purple light.

 

The axe vanishes, so close to Emma that there’s a shallow cut on her nose, and she can only stare ahead, unable to think of anything that might make this better because that was magic, unmistakable magic that the Capitol has seen from Henry and Regina, and they’re in more danger now than they were with an axe spinning toward them. _No one can know_. She can’t lose Henry, not during the Games and not after them, not even if she’s not there to see it, but she doesn’t know how to hide _that_ from the cameras, either.

 

Graham is pale as he slips into the woods, his face twisted with confusion, and she finally tries an unconvincing, “Quick sleight-of-hand, Regina. I barely even saw you knock it into the water.”

 

Regina can only nod, managing a feeble, “Yes, well, survival instinct,” before her fingers are twitching toward her pack, fumbling with the leather cover that conceals her weapons.

“Frustrated?” Emma offers, reaching out to cover the other woman’s hand with her own before she can pull out another knife. She forces fear from her face, replacing it with determination that she can cajole- no, _demand_ \- from Regina.

 

Regina tilts her head to regard Emma for a moment, her breathing slowing as she struggles for purchase in front of the cameras. “I’m not accustomed to being defended,” she says haltingly, brushing the tension away in exchange for new discomfort. “I don’t like it.”

 

Emma licks her lips, uncomfortable. “Sorry?”

 

“No, I…” Regina sighs. “I’m doing this wrong. I don’t like being in a position where I’m at a loss,” she corrects. “But you were… Thank you,” she murmurs, turning her hand so she can squeeze Emma’s against her.

 

A smaller hand presses against both of theirs, and they look down to see Henry grinning up at them. “You were great, Mom,” he says, and if there’s a shadow hooding his eyes, the knowledge of their impending end still close, it’s one they all share and don’t discuss at all.

 

* * *

 

“His name was Daniel,” Regina says when they’re back in place for the night, Milah’s face barely faded from the darkened sky.

 

“What?”

 

“My first kill in my Games.” She’s sitting up against Emma, their shoulders touching, and they’re sharing their watches again for reasons that go beyond the mistrust that’s guided Emma until now. Regina’s eyes are fixed on her for a moment, knowingly. “That is what you’ve been wondering all this time, hasn’t it? What everyone wants to know about my Games. Why I...” She exhales. “His name was Daniel.”

 

Emma stares into the darkness. She doesn’t remember the names of her kills during her Games. She’d been lucky, her magic protecting her as it had Henry, and she’d spent more time running than killing, but there had been three- no, four- who’d attacked her when she didn’t dare display her abilities. Their faces had been burned into her mind, bloody from her knife or gasping out their last breaths, and they’ve been dulled only vaguely with time. “One of the other Careers?”

 

“District Ten, actually. He was eighteen, just barely within the age limit for the Games. We met during training.” Regina curls and uncurls her fingers, staring down into them as though they hide secrets beyond her comprehension. “I was young. Gentle, idealistic, not quite the sort of Career that wins Games. I suppose Mother meant for the Games to make me strong.” She shifts against Emma, tilting her head so her lips are brushing Emma’s cheek in what might be a useless attempt at secrecy. “She knew before I did of my latent abilities. She must have known that I would win.”

 

She turns back to face the trees around them, and something within Emma protests at the absence of the other woman’s breath against her skin. “Daniel was kind to me in the training room. He spoke of sacrifice and goodness and fighting for what was right, not what was easy. He made survival sound like the ignoble option in the Games, and I drank it all in and agreed vehemently.

 

“I was the first to reach the Cornucopia- I did have the training, even if I didn’t commit to it as I should have,” Regina reminds her. “Daniel was just behind me.”

 

“Oh,” Emma whispers, because she’s seen this happen in other Games to the younger, more impressionable tributes. They find an older kid to trust and–

 

“I handed him a sword and he swung it at my heart,” Regina says blankly. “I blocked him with a dagger and carved out his heart. It was so quick, I doubt it even made it onto the cameras. The bloodbath was…busy that year.” She barks out a laugh. “Now I understand him, and I don’t even begrudge him the betrayal. Survival _is_ the only thing that matters in the Games.” Emma glances at her, suddenly wary, but Regina doesn’t notice. “Then, it was enough to shatter me for good. Seeing those bodies around me, seeing Daniel’s and knowing that it had been my doing…I didn’t care about living through the Games, I just wanted to be _away_. I wanted to be out of the arena, and I stopped concerning myself with anything but that desire.”

 

“So you killed everyone.” Emma’s skin still crawls at the knowledge of it, at the way Regina had valued human lives so little, but she thinks she understands regardless. It isn’t unheard of for a tribute to lose their mind in the arena, to shut down completely or to go on a killing spree. Regina is unique because she’d done both, and she’d done them so _efficiently_. The Gamemakers like to finish off the dangerously insane ones before they can be named victor most of the time, cognizant that their audience wants heroes, not killers. They’d failed only once.

 

“It’s all rather a blur,” Regina admits. “I remember Daniel, and I remember Mother in the Capitol to greet me, snapping _What have you done?_ The rest felt like a dream even when I was living it.” Her shoulders drop. “And I never returned to the arena, as a mentor or otherwise.”

 

“Until now.”

 

“Until Henry,” Regina agrees, and now she’s stiffening, drawing herself away, and Emma’s suddenly so afraid of Regina retreating from whatever connection they’ve made that she’s grabbing the Career’s wrist before she can think about it, pulling her closer and blurting out, “When I found out I was pregnant with Henry, I tried to stab myself in the stomach.”

 

Regina stills. “Emma?”

 

She forges on, suddenly determined to give Regina a story of as much value as her own. “I’d known his dad for a few months before the Games. He’d been a runaway from the Capitol, and I didn’t have anyone else, and I guess we just kind of fell together after a while.” She remembers stolen cars and stolen everything and those months when she was seventeen and thought she might have a future for the first time since she’d first been found as an infant on the side of the road. “I think his father must have seen him during the Reaping- he’d made a ruckus trying to get to me, and the cameras caught it all- because I never saw him again.”

 

Regina’s hand is suddenly at her knee, squeezing tentatively. “I’m sorry.”

 

“I didn’t even know I was pregnant until I came out of the Games and the doctors discovered it.” She feels tears sting her eyes at the memory. “I looked at my stomach and I thought that I could never give birth to a child who would have to go through what I had. I wanted him to be safe, and right then, the only safe place I could imagine was death.” She chews on her lip, bitter and savage. “And now he’s been to the Games fucking _twice_ in thirteen years.”

 

A soft murmur from the woman beside her. “You’ve done everything for him.”

 

“He saved me, Regina.” She’s crying in earnest now, her face wet and raw with emotion. “He’s the only reason I didn’t kill myself back then and the only reason I held on until now. And now I can’t give him anything else ever again except his life. I can’t keep him safe and I can’t protect him and _I don’t want him to grow up like me_!” The words tear from her throat in a scream and she can’t think of anything, can’t see or remember the danger or even her sleeping son a few feet away.

 

“Hush.” The voice is commanding, breaking through her terror and recriminations and despair for a moment, and then a soft, firm palm is cupping her cheek, brushing away the tears. “Hush,” Regina repeats in a gentler tone, and Emma blinks until she can make out those brown eyes blazing just inches away. “Have faith,” she whispers against Emma’s trembling mouth.

 

Emma laughs roughly, unintimidated by the cameras for once. “In what? The Capitol?”

 

“In _me_ ,” Regina says, and then their lips crash together and Emma is gulping in air and gasping it out as she tangles her tongue with Regina’s, as she feels teeth closing on her lower lip and as she buries her fists in Regina’s jumpsuit and presses a leg between the other woman’s, suckling at her neck as Regina gasps.

 

Regina is writhing beneath her, her hands moving to her chest, and this is _good_ , this feels more right than anything else has in days. “Emma, wait,” she says raggedly, but her neck is thrown back and her hands are moving faster and Emma is gasping against her too. “We have…an audience…ahh!”

 

Emma looks up, her eyes hooded and her breath escaping in short gasps. “Screw the Capitol,” she says, and means it. This might be their last day alive, and she doesn’t give a damn anymore, not when Regina tastes so good and she just wants this one last thing for herself, this tiny selfishness that she’ll never have to know any consequences to. _I want this to be forever_ , she thinks, echoing her thoughts from earlier on the beach, and she thinks this might not be a bad ending, as far as endings go.

 

Regina’s eyes shine with regret and affection, her hand rising to stroke Emma’s cheek again. “I didn’t mean them,” she murmurs, raising her eyebrows significantly to call Emma’s attention to Henry, still asleep but shifting at the noise they must have been making.

 

Emma flushes. “Right.” She pulls away clumsily, cursing her own recklessness at forgetting her son, even for a moment. Now is the absolute worst time to scar Henry for life, tempting as Regina still looks with her once perfect hair wild and untamed and her lips swollen and that reddening mark on her throat and…

 

She leans down again to brush another kiss to the other woman’s lips, unwilling to pull away just yet, and sinks down beside her to lay her head down on Regina’s arm and throw a possessive arm over her waist. “You couldn’t come back to the Games before now?” she says, half-serious.

 

Regina snickers. “I would have been a terrible mentor. And you would have hated me.” She tangles her fingers into Emma’s hair. “I’m not a people person.”

 

“You were great with Henry,” Emma retorts. “I think he likes you more than he likes me.”

 

“He loves you. And he knows you love him more than anything.” Regina’s thumb brushes against the shell of her ear. “I promise you he’s going to be safe.”

 

Emma hesitates, and in the silence, a cannon booms somewhere in the distance. “You can’t keep that promise,” she says, sobered by the reminder. “And even if he survives the Games…” She pushes the thought of Henry, doing magic out in the open, from her mind, because if she thinks about that danger she doesn’t know if she’ll be able to keep going.

 

“I can,” Regina says forcefully, and her tone is one that tolerates no dissent. She strokes Emma’s hair, achingly slow. “Go to sleep, Emma. I’ll take this watch until Henry’s up.”

 

Her eyes are already closing, the warmth of the body against hers lulling her to sleep before Regina finishes speaking.

 

* * *

 

She wakes up when a hailstone hits the rock behind her and her magic deflects the flying ice automatically. “Henry?” she shouts. “Regina?”

 

Nothing.

 

She reaches blindly through the ice flying around her, stumbling around their camp in an attempt to find her son and Regina, but there’s nothing there, no one remaining in the vicinity. “Regina!” she calls again, but it’s swallowed by the winds that gust around her, and she staggers through the storm, struggling to remember the general direction of safety.

 

The others must have awakened and run right away, not realizing that she’d still been trapped within the barrier. Regina would know to take Henry first and let Emma fend for herself, she’s sure of it.

 

But there’s an uneasy suspicion creeping up within her as she flees, a slow dread that she can’t explain filling her when she breaks through the barrier and finds nobody nearby. _It can’t be_.

 

She presses cold hands to her hips, brushing them off against her wet jumpsuit, and makes her way down to the beach.

 

She trusts Regina at last, after days of doubt and wariness, and she can’t imagine that Regina would leave her behind to die. Not when Emma herself has acknowledged time and again that she doesn’t intend to survive these Games. There’s no _point_ to it, not when Regina has seemed equally determined to keep Henry safe and- while she isn’t entirely sure how she feels about Regina- she believes in Regina’s fondness for Henry.

 

They’re safe. Somewhere, they’re both alive and safe.

 

She reaches the beach and is disappointed to see that it’s abandoned, the Cornucopia left bare and no one even keeping guard there. The cannon had only gone off once during the night, hadn’t it? She doesn’t know if she’d slept through another death. _Or another two_.

 

She sinks to the ground, unwilling to contemplate anymore, and stretches out in the sun, feeling its heat drying off her suit and warming her up. She’ll wait here. They’ll come here to look for her.

 

* * *

 

But they don’t come, and after an hour or two, she’s restless and begins to circle the beach, walking alongside the parts they’d never bothered exploring. She wonders who’d died the night before, if Killian and Mulan are still in the woods, if Graham had encountered Regina and Henry again. But there are no cannons, no sign of movement from anyone else, and she chews so hard on her lip that it swells up under her teeth.

 

It’s when the tidal wave that had thrown her into the water days before hits across the beach that she hears the cannon again, and she freezes, a hand squeezing into a fist as she draws her knife with the other. “Henry? Regina!” she shouts, uncaring of her last two opponents, somewhere in the woods. “Henry!”

 

But instead she sees a slim figure hurled into the air, her long hair torn loose by the water and her body bent and broken, a crescent sword still clutched in her grip even in death. “Mulan,” she whispers, and only then does she see a second figure swimming through the waves, struggling with his single hand to direct himself toward her, the water red around him.

 

She seizes him when he’s close, half-relieved to see the stab wound in his stomach and avoid another fight. “She got me good before the tsunami hit,” Killian wheezes. “It’s been quite the journey.”

 

“Were there any cannons since nightfall?” she demands. There’s no time for niceties or farewells, not when he looks like death and he’s dripping what must be gallons of blood into the sand.

 

She thinks it might be the first time Killian Jones has bothered to answer her question on point. “Just one,” he says, and her heart sinks. “That was Graham,” he adds, seeing her eyes flicker with panic. “We saw him ripped apart by a monstrous beast in the woods.”

 

“Oh.” She can’t think to mourn, not when it means that Henry and Regina are alive somewhere out there, and she can’t stop the relief that washes over her face. “Thank you, Killian,” she sighs, taking his hand between hers.

 

“My pleasure to be of service to such a lovely…” His voice trails off, his eyes dim, and his hand falls limp in hers.

 

She waits until the cannon sounds and a hovercraft appears to collect him and Mulan before she stands again, her eyes on the forest once more.

 

Regina and Henry are still out there somewhere. And now it’s just the three of them.

 

She’s not going to stop until she finds them.

 

* * *

 

The setup of the woods is identical in each wedge of land, she discovers. There’s a huge tree near the center, leading into the clearing where Peter had nearly attacked them and where they’d hidden before the fireflies had come. The same outcropping of rock and moss is a bit further back, and she can sense the edge of the force field surrounding the arena about fifty feet behind it. She’d been mistaken in her first assessment of her surroundings. The arena isn’t actually that much smaller than the one she’d been in during her first Games, but that one had been all mountains and valleys and caves, and traveling had taken much more time.

 

This arena had been designed so the main threats would be the other tributes, and she coughs out a sobbing laugh at the thought of that and shouts out, “Regina! Henry!” for the hundredth time, searching the land around her for movement.

 

She’s walking for nearly an hour when she passes through a disturbance that she recognizes as one of her own making from her mad stumble from the fireflies. Their first pitcher is under one of the bushes, dark with moisture, and she lifts it, feeling the damp wood within it.

 

But they haven’t been back in days, and even if Graham or Killian had been using it, it wouldn’t be quite so moist now, still chilled from the ice water that it had been filled with. No, this means…

 

“Henry!” she calls out, her voice hoarse with desperation. “Regina! I know you’re out here!”

 

There’s a flash of movement, a small blue-clad figure racing through the underbrush, and Emma takes off after him, running unsteadily through the brush, past the tree, toward the beach where Henry’s fleeing.

 

“Henry! _Henry_!” She doesn’t know why he’s running from her, what Regina’s plans are with them both. Is this some brainwashing technique? Have they created a new alliance without her? It doesn’t make _sense_ , none of this makes sense, and she fights the urge to cry out in frustration and bewilderment at the sky. “Henry, stop!”

 

She emerges onto the beach in time to see Henry racing across it, past the wedge where the tidal wave comes from and toward the next barrier, stopping in his tracks when he spots what appears to be a wolf-sized beetle within it.

 

“What are you _doing_?” Emma demands, starting forward again, and it’s then that another hand catches her on the shoulder, holding her in place.

 

“Emma,” Regina rumbles in her ear. “Emma, you need to let us go.”

 

“What the hell are you talking about?” And Regina is walking past her now, joining Henry where he’s turned to stare at her solemnly, both their faces set with a tight determination that she doesn’t understand.

 

“You know what this is about, Mom,” Henry says for the both of them. They don’t look like they’re planning on hurting her or preparing a coup, not when they both look so _sad_ and there’s nothing more than affection on both their faces. “You’ve known since Graham’s attack. You must have.”

 

“Since…Graham’s…” _No._ She remembers the magic her companions had both used so blatantly, the way they’d all shrugged it off and known that their cover was probably blown and hadn’t had the energy to think about it.

 

Apparently, she’d been the only one who hadn’t considered the consequences further.

 

Regina offers her a small smile. “This has to be the end for us. The alternative is…” Her voice trails off and she squeezes Henry’s shoulder. “Not our preference. I’d rather be dead than be a guinea pig for the Capitol.”

 

“Dead,” Emma repeats, her eyes flickering to Henry as realization dawns. “Like _hell_. You’re not going anywhere.”

 

But Henry is shaking his head. “Regina’s right, Mom. You don’t have any magic.” An outright lie for the cameras, a final attempt to keep her safe. Her _thirteen-year-old son_ , trying to keep _her_ safe. “You’re the only one who can get out of this and still be okay.” He breaks away from Regina, running back to her to throw his arms around her. “I love you,” he whispers, and she shakes her head.

 

“No. Absolutely not.” And she’s on automatic now, determined to do whatever is left to keep Henry alive. Her knife is in her hand and she’s pressing it to her own throat, feeling the skin break and blood dripping onto the tips of her fingers. “You are going to live if it’s the last thing I do.” Sacrifice is so easy for Henry, and if she’s weeping, she doesn’t know why, doesn’t want to think about what lies ahead for her son. “I can’t- can’t–“

 

She’s growing dizzy with blood loss, and she slips in Henry’s arms, feeling another stronger set of arms catch her and lower her to the ground. There’s something warm and healing at her neck, soft lips pressed to her brow, and a woman’s voice murmurs, “Goodbye, Emma.”

 

She feels sand against her back and when she squints upward, she can see lightning split the sky, a flash against her half-closed eyelids. She struggles to turn, to see Henry and Regina, but all she sees are two figures walking toward the lightning storm together, hand-in-hand.

 

There’s another flash of light and fire everywhere, and there’s a bright halo illuminating the last two tributes in the arena as they’re consumed by light around them, shining brighter and brighter in her half-dazed state. She turns, crawling toward them, but they’re too bright, too far out of reach, and she doesn’t know if she’s moving at all.

 

“Henry,” she whimpers one last time, and he grows impossibly bright, silhouetted against the fire, and fades away into nothingness.

 

She closes her eyes as the cannons sound; once, twice, and there’s a booming announcement around her, filling her heart and chest and mind because there’s nothing else left within them, and Emma drifts away from the brightness to the dark.

 

* * *

 

She’s lying on a soft bed in a white room, an orange afterimage still lingering in her eyes when she opens them at last, and when she reaches up to touch her neck gingerly, there’s only a faintly raised line of puckered skin there. “I’m alive,” she says, and feels the weight of it on her chest.

 

“Indeed,” agrees an oddly accented voice to her right, and she jerks up, hands grasping for a knife that’s no longer by her side.

 

“Where am I? Who the hell are you?” Her eyes dart frantically around the room, pausing on the man seated beside her bed. He lacks the standard colorful accouterments of the Capitol, wearing only a simple, expensive-looking suit and bearing a wooden cane. Nevertheless, she knows that that’s exactly where he’s from, and exactly what he’s doing there.

 

“You may call me Mr. Gold,” the man offers, toying with the ornate handle of his cane.

 

“Regina’s teacher,” she guesses. It hurts to say her name now, to think of her, her face so close, her neck thrown back as Emma closes her lips over it. She thinks she understands now how Regina could have remembered Daniel’s name, could have kept someone who’d touched her so deeply in her mind for so many years. _Regina_ , she thinks, and wants to weep with despair.

 

“Mm.” He smiles, his lips splitting to reveal teeth bared in a shark-like grin. “Then you know why I’m here.”

 

_Magic_. The Capitol hadn’t removed her from suspicion even with Henry’s declaration (and his name hurts so severely that she can feel her heart constrict at only the thought of his face), and now she’s trapped and he’d died for nothing. “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” she says, struggling to keep her expression stiff and unyielding.

 

Gold cocks his head. “Yes, President Snow was willing to take your son’s words at face value, I’m afraid,” he says, and she’s relieved for a moment before he smiles again. “But I think we all know that she holds little true power here, dearie. You may not be as young as most of my students, but you may prove…pliable,” he adds.

 

She stares at him with hostile eyes. “Sorry to disappoint, but I don’t have any magic. Henry’s must have come from his father’s side.” She watches his eyes narrow in response and knows that he _knows_ , that her suspicions were correct.

 

“I see,” he says at last. “My apologies for the misunderstanding. You’re free to return home now.” He rises, leaning heavily on his cane. “I do hope you’ll look me up after your victory tour. I find myself rather…invested in your future.”

 

She pulls herself from the bed, noting that there’s no pain or soreness anymore, her wounds all healed with magic or medicine, she doesn’t know which. _How long was I out?_

 

She doesn’t ask Gold, too focused on escaping this room and its occupant to remain any longer, but she does hesitate by the door with one question. “Where is…what happened to Neal?” It’s haunted her for years. She’d made no secret of the fact that she had a son and she’d gone on her victory tour noticeably pregnant, and there’s a part of her even now that doesn’t understand how Neal could have been taken home and never found out that he had a son. How he’d never approached her during the Games for the past thirteen years.

 

Gold’s eyes glitter dangerously. “ _Baelfire_ ,” he corrects, “Was traumatized by his time in the lesser districts. We did all we could to help heal him.”

 

She tenses, recognizing the euphemism for what it is. “You wiped his memory. He doesn’t even know about Henry.”

 

“I’ve never forgotten about the boy,” Gold says pleasantly, but there’s a finality in his voice that warns that he will not be pleasant for long. “Nor will I now. Do return home, Miss Swan. I look forward to seeing you again soon.”

 

She exits the room, uncertain if she’s just made a very dangerous friend or enemy.

 

* * *

 

The Victor’s Village seems larger, somehow, looming over her as she returns. There’s the sapling Henry had planted at the entrance when he was three, mocking her with its full, leafy branches. There’s a bicycle still chained to the gate, a baseball lying in the grass on the path leading to her house, a thousand memories of Henry taunting her and leaving her throat constricting and her eyes red and dry as she approaches.

 

Somehow, her memories of Henry have entangled themselves with her memories of Regina, and she finds herself studying the porch, imagining the other woman seated in the lawn chair and mocking their sad ineptitude at basketball. She can see Regina planting flowers in the garden Emma’s never really bothered with, can picture her walking down the road to the house as though she owns the entire district. Regina had been _family_ near the end, the third point to complete them, and now they’re both gone and Emma hasn’t felt this desperate to just… _not exist_ since the end of her first Hunger Games.

 

She doesn’t dare open the door to her home yet, not when Henry’s presence is looming all around her and her eyes are beginning to water with the thought of him and the woman she’d left behind in the Games. Instead, she sinks to the floor of the porch and bends over on the steps, her heart aching and bereft and ready to grieve at last.

 

_I can’t do this. I can’t go on alone_. She curls into herself, wrapping her arms around her thighs and resting her forehead on her knees, and when she cries, it’s with ragged sobs that refuse to escape all at once, that jerk her whole body forward each time she suffers one.

 

_Henry. Henry. Henry._

_(Regina.)_

 

She thinks she can smell lasagna baking in the oven for a moment and nearly laughs at the irony of it, at the impossibility that this moment is for her. She’d never meant to survive the Games. She shouldn’t even _be_ here. It would have been better if Ruby or Graham had lived than this, if it had been someone who wouldn’t have to cope with losing a mother or son in the Games.

 

She inhales, the sobs catching in her throat and the self-pity threatening to overwhelm her when she notices that the smell of lasagna is still in the air. “What the hell?” she mumbles. The Victor’s Village is isolated from the rest of the city, and there are no people foolish enough to trespass in the only place where Peacekeepers routinely patrol. Is this some kind of imaginary sense memory, brought up by thoughts of family?

 

Or…

 

She remembers Regina’s whispered listing of some of the abilities she’d been trained in. _Focus, elemental skills, teleportation and transmutation, healing. Teleportation._

It’s impossible. She’d watched them fade away before her eyes. She’d heard the cannons. She’d seen–

 

She rises before she can stop herself, hope daring to overcome her for the first time since the Games had ended, and throws open her front door.

 


End file.
